I gave a small shake of my head to clear my mind. There were buckets of blood upstairs on that bed, and it was the real thing. The smell of it hung in the room like a fog. Of course it was Jasper’s. Wasn’t it?

I reached for the mug Norton had left for me. Earlier, he’d served the family coffee with a side of cream, but to mine he added the cream in the kitchen. It lay on the surface of the coffee, refusing to blend in, and when I took a sip I found it oddly bitter. Flustered, I set it down. I didn’t know Philip Norton. Why should I trust him? What if the drink was spiked?

I tried to chase the idea from my mind. It wasn’t logical. I’d already eaten an entire meal cooked by Norton and was fine, but that didn’t matter. It was happening again. This time the flashback was physical, moving like a worm under my skin. I was light-headed and itchy. My skin crawled, just as if there really was a drug back in my veins.

The room was unfamiliar, with no windows. A bare bulb hung above me, its pull string emitting a tinny clink as it swayed. It felt like someone cracked open my skull and filled it with hot, shifting sand. I tasted blood and realized my lips were chapped and split. Where was I? What day was it? I didn’t know.

“Shay.”

It took me a minute to find him in that too-bright room. Bram shifted his messenger bag and took out a bottle of water. “You thirsty? Hey, don’t be scared. We know each other. Remember, Shay?”

“—support the family business our entire careers, and Jasper swoops in and starts derailing all our work.”

“What?” I blinked, and Bebe’s face swam into view, but I couldn’t process her words. Meditation. That’s what Carson would prescribe at a time like this. See these anxious thoughts, acknowledge what they’re doing to my body, and zero in on my breathing. Give the brain an object to focus on. Quiet that jumpy monkey mind.

“I said Jasper’s already tried to sabotage Sinclair Fabrics,” said Bebe, “and now he’s moved on to sabotaging our private lives.”

Mindfulness. Awareness. A crazy woman in my face. Snap out of it, Shay. “Just . . . slow down.”

“Try to keep up,” Bebe said with a roll of her eyes.

“What she’s saying,” said Miles, studying me with an expression of concern, “is Jasper isn’t following Flynn and Bebe’s rules and they’re pissed as hell.”

He’d hardly spoken a word since we sat down. Miles obviously expected me to glean some information from Bebe’s account. Either she wasn’t getting there fast enough for him, or he was starting to worry she wouldn’t get there at all. “What she’s not telling you,” he said, “is without Jasper the business would already be sunk.”

Bebe looked aghast. “That’s a lie.”

“It’s really not.”

“Business isn’t going well?” I said, finally coming around.